2700 Noise Floor

C

C.A.Magid

Active member
Long time reader of these great forums, first time poster. Figured this was the best spot for a Varicam question.

I've been an owner/operator of F, H and now 2700 model Varicams.

We have only been shooting on the 2700 since March but I am concerned about what seems to be a high noise floor. The noise is monochromatic and nearly uniform. It is easier to see in shadows, 50% gray, darker colors and highly saturated colors. It has the character of noise seen when a camera is lightly gained up. Not heavy but definitely not clean or low noise.

We stick to 720p AVC-Intra 100. We shoot mostly in film rec but do work occasionally in video rec with one of the film like gammas or a Macie custom setting. Our detail is generally set low and we are typically at -3db or 0db. We regularly black balance and the scenes are usually well lighted.

Any ideas on how to settle this down or where to look for a clue?

Appears as noisy or perhaps more so than our recently retired H.

C.A.Magid
RTVF
 
Gary. Thanks for your input.

Yes. We regularly black balance. Have gotten into the habit of doing it anytime the camera is power cycled or a lens is changed.

We have even sent the camera to Macie Video for setup.

It isn't extremely noisy. We certainly expect a little noise lifted blacks or shadows. Overall the 2700 doesn't seem any cleaner in the noise department than our retired H, may actually have more grain.

Get the feeling we are just missing a setting or something since many folks rave about the 2700.

The 10bit AVC-Intra codec and true 1280x720 format do make a huge difference in overall image quality and resiliency through post.

Hopefully we can get the noise situation under control. Unfortunately there isn't a lot of 2700 specific documentation and the camera is different enough from the older H that the Goodman's guide is not entirely applicable or descriptive.

Perhaps I am little bit too much of an image snob. We may have too critical of an eye.

C.A.Magid
RTVF
 
Have you seen the BBC report on the 2700 as it may help : http://thebrownings.name/WHP034/pdf/WHP034-ADD35_Panasonic_HPX2700.pdf

I mainly use the 371 and 3700 and have found them both Ok for noise but I never go above +6db gain and have them set-up as per BBC spec.

What are you looking at the pictures on as I have found that the direct outputs can be a lot more noisy that the fully rendered images out of the edit suite, also just looking on a monitor hooked up the the edit system can not be a true take on what is there as edit packages such as final cut pro do not play back the full bandwidth.
 
Gary.

Matter of fact I have read the BBC report. I am kind of crazy like that.

The 370 and 3700 do appear to be lower noise cameras.

Think the 2700 came along at odd time and was sort of a mix of what Panasonic had already developed. It is a nice package, all things considered. AVC Intra 100 at 10bit does a lot for post and the 60fps slow motion looks as good as any slow motion I have seen from any rig.

Plus I actually prefer 720p to 1080p, especially when dealing with talent in medium close-ups and closer. My experience with the 3700 was that it had too much detail even when dumbed down all the way.

We currently look at pictures in the field on LH1700 and in our edit suites on LH2550s, pro plasmas and BVM CRTS. It is by comparison I judge the noise the level. Other footage from other rigs including our older H seem less noisy in similar situations.

Thanks for the info!!!
 
I think you may be right the 2000 ser camera's are now quite old and I think are actually discontinued in the UK.

I agree that 720p is nicer and that is what I deliver for on-line and work for computer playback but shoot everything in AVC Intra 100 1920x1080i 25p as that is the native chipset resolution of the 371 and 3700.

Had a look at the 3100 recently and it is a nice camera but sadly missing 720 and varicam operations so as not to step on the 2700/3700.

I also find that noise and skew (on the CMOS 300 ser) are better in PAL than NTSC modes so it may be that I am not seeing the same as you are.
 
This is disappointing. You'd think @ this level of camera - we have Clean, Clean images.
I too am an image snob and I want the best possible image - ALWAYS!
 
videoatlanta said:
This is disappointing. You'd think @ this level of camera - we have Clean, Clean images.
I too am an image snob and I want the best possible image - ALWAYS!
Click to expand...

Well just to keep things in perspective, I find the camera a little more noisy than I would like. It isn't very noisy, just enough to be noticed when dissecting image quality. Enough for the BBC to comment on it but certainly not enough to make it an unacceptable choice as they seem to like it. Since there are many 2700s in the field and not many complaints my thinking is with some care I can tame the beast. Although, don't think super clean is going to happen.

Many people loved the Varicam H. The 2700 seems very similar regarding noise floor. We were hoping for some improvement with noise. It is vastly improved in many other ways.
 
Thought a follow up could be helpful. I summed a lot of advice I've received from this list, the CML, personal emails and elsewhere. With a little work the noise floor of the HPX 2700 was reduced considerably. Much cleaner. Still a little noise in shadows or down values.

The following combination produced the cleanest results:

no additional vertical or horizontal detail
high horizontal frequency settings
moderate detail coring (careful here)
low or no detail enhancement or detail off
low knee point with gentle slope
film-rec gamma or film like 2 gamma

Depending on the look you can further clean things up by turning off the matrix and color correction in the individual gain levels. This produces something flat akin to the original Varicam in Film Rec.

Depending on your exposure and content you can crush the black gamma a bit and expand the range effected to keep shadows from creeping into dark grays.

I did not notice a great deal of difference between -3db an 0db gain. 0db seems preferable to me.

The BBC documents on the camera are a great place to start. As is the panasonic digi-neg scene file.
 
Thanks for your posts. Noise seems to be the achilles heel of Panasonic cameras. I have used an HPX-500 for some time and DVC-200s before that. My approach has always been to dial down the detail settings and push the coring to just under the mush showing up. Sharpening is applied in post. This results in a soft-ish look right out of the camera but the detail appears after I add my filters in the NLE. It is a shame to hear this battle must still be fought with their flagship camera.

BTW, I was researching the 2700 yesterday and was amazed to find the P.O.S. LCD that is on the camera! Not that one uses the LCD very often but it can be useful in a quick pinch.
 
Well softening via reduced detail is not as big of an issue with Varicams and their near relatives. For years we actually did whatever we could to dial out as much detail as possible of our H to make kinder, gentler images. Suppose it depends on subject matter. Running the 2700 with detail off and no further enhancement produces very acceptable images. Very desirable in interviews and close ups. Perhaps wide shots could suffer a bit with high detail subject matter.

Detail coring is something to keep an eye on. As you suggest, it will mush some things up if you go crazy. We are very conservative applying it and could probably reduce noise further if we were as liberal with it as some other shooters are.

The LCD is not impressive. We think of it as an interface device for the P2 system.
 
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